


The devil's in the details

by FlippedScript



Series: Spider-Man's New York Tour (AU) [6]
Category: Spider-Man (Tom Holland Movies)
Genre: (peace), Based on a Taylor Swift Song, Established Relationship, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Sadder than intended, blame the song
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-25
Updated: 2020-07-25
Packaged: 2021-03-05 20:26:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,009
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25501339
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FlippedScript/pseuds/FlippedScript
Summary: They find the ways to show their love in the little things. They hide tins of tea in between the couch cushions and behind the TV, and fold each other’s laundry and pick up dinner for the both of them when one is busy.MJ and Peter's summer, set to Taylor Swift's "peace". Compliant with the rest of this AU, but also with Canon.
Relationships: Michelle Jones/Peter Parker
Series: Spider-Man's New York Tour (AU) [6]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1557637
Comments: 9
Kudos: 59





	The devil's in the details

**Author's Note:**

> This is a songfic, which I've never written before. I hope you enjoy it!
> 
> You can listen to "peace" [here](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HpxX4ZE4KWE&list=PLINj2JJM1jxNNBnGb3WvHmcyCyfl0VlJX&index=16).

MJ and Peter grew up in each others circles, and then drifted apart. Somehow, they come back together again though, and, as romantic as it is to say it, they fall in love. They’re older now, not grown up quite yet, if the way they still like to cuddle and watch Disney movies instead of the news is any indication, but they are older.

They can tell that by the way that they understand the math on the boards of fake classrooms in the now-old TV shows they watch together for the memories, and in the way that they know what stocks are, and even own a few of them. They aren’t old yet, but they are grown ups, and that feels weird, but it feels right.

* * *

They first talk about Capital-M Marriage in March, and only briefly and in passing. It’s only been a few months since they started dating, of course, so they don’t sit down and talk about what it would look like or anything, but it still comes up in passing, as a “who would you invite to a wedding” type of thing. MJ doesn’t think her family needs to know that Peter is Spider-Man, which does complicate things, but their social circles are both fairly small, and Peter is confident they can make it work.

He’s scared of the idea of getting married though, something he’s honest about. He tells MJ about how he knows that it’ll make her an even more obvious target when his identity is inevitably revealed to the world. He tells her, in the quiet of the night, about how if he were to die, god forbid, it would be easier to do so as her boyfriend than as her husband, and he thinks she understands that, but he doesn’t know if she cares. By summer, when MJ lets him move in and they’re agreed that marriage can wait, Peter wishes it doesn’t have to, but forces himself to be responsible. The truth, that he'll only admit to himself in the quiet darkness, is that she's too good for him.

* * *

MJ works to be there for Peter however she can. Most of the time, she accomplishes that by employing skills from an online first aid class, and being there to stitch up the wounds that stray gunshots leave. Peter has more scars than anyone she knows, even Matt, a web of them on his back, each a reminder of at least one life saved as a bullet came a bit too close to comfort. Half the time, the bullet wounds don’t even scar, especially as MJ's stitches gets better and she improves at first aid. And when Peter breaks down, overcome by the stress of being New York’s favorite hero or the grief he feels every time he realizes that the man he fails to save was someone’s Uncle Ben, MJ is there with a kiss on the forehead, patience, and a hug for as long as he needs one.

That summer, when Spider-Man has death with one too many random-citizen marriage proposals in public, he (with her permission) tells the world that he does have a girlfriend, and that he’d like them to just stop proposing, please, for the love of god. For the most part, people do, and MJ would be lying if she isn’t a little proud that it’s her that talk show hosts are trying to figure out who Spider-Man is in love with, and not just pairing him off with another supermodel chasing their fifteen minute of fame with an outlandish claim. Of course, there are the people who think it’s all fake, or some kind of setup, or that Spider-Man’s girlfriend is using him, but Peter and MJ know the truth, and that’s what matters.

* * *

They find the ways to show their love in the little things. They hide tins of tea in between the couch cushions and behind the TV, and fold each other’s laundry and pick up dinner for the both of them when one is busy. Their routines slot together well, and it only takes a week before neither can remember how they got by before.

They expect to fall out of the honeymoon phase of moving in together, and they do, to an extent, replacing the kisses hello and goodbye that make them feel like they’re lovestruck teenagers with simple smiles that say just as much about how they feel for one another. They're still in love though, and they still blush a little bit when the other balls them babe. They’re not _just_ dating, they come to realize, but they’re best friends, too, and they have been since they were messaging each other about Ethics and the Legal code almost a decade ago.

* * *

Things are still hectic though, but they don't mind, for the most part. Even so Michelle can’t help but worry, sometimes, that she isn’t good enough for Peter. It’s hard not to feel that way of course, when she cuddles up next to New York’s paragon of goodness at night, and the wee hours of the morning remind her of how flawed she is, especially compared to someone like Peter.

Yet Peter knows of all his flaws, of all of the times that he beats a man half to death in hopes that he does know a little more about where the trafficking ring is set up, and he worries he’ll taint MJ’s goodness. He can see it of course, beneath her faux-tough exterior and her snark, and he loves her for it. He gets her a painting set and canvases for her birthday - he remembers when she used to sketch things back at Midtown, back before he left because of Spider-Man and Ben and everything else.

She gets bored of the canvases one day, and surprises him a few later with a small mural, one of him and Miles and Spider-Gwen swinging right through the wall of their bathroom. He loves it, and he loves her, and he’s a little surprised that anyone so wonderful could see anything in him.

* * *

MJ can’t help but make fun of Peter, sometimes. When she and Karen and Foggy are cooped up at the office, pretending there is more work to be done to distract themselves from the fact that their loved ones are risking their lives for people they’ve never met. Karen is dating Peter or Matt, of course, but MJ can tell that she loves them both like a sister, so she and Foggy and Karen all gossip and make fun of their loved ones while they risk their lives. It feels a bit like betrayal, choosing to cope that way, but thinking of Peter at helps make him feel closer to her, even when he’s off fighting Wilson Fisk for the fifth time this month. 

* * *

Peter will do anything for MJ, of course. He’d probably kill someone if she asked, and she knows it. She would for him, too. she’s helped handle recon for him, and on more than one instance, planted a tracker on someone who she really wouldn’t be going within 100 yards of, if Peter could help it. She reads to him while he's on stakeouts, his headphones quiet in his ears as he watches for motion in what might not even be a criminal safehouse.

He would do anything for her, at least he thinks, until Michelle mentions offhandedly that she wants to have kids one day. She realizes that Peter’s silence means that something is wrong faster than anyone else ever could, and he explains, though halting words and tears, that he can’t have kids, due to the whole radioactivity thing. They stay quiet for the rest of the night, and Michelle cries with him, cuddling in blankets on the couch. They take sick days the next day and stay in silence, because they don’t need words to understand each other, they’re far past that.

* * *

Aunt May become MJ’s Aunt in all but blood, after a while. It feels almost ironic, because she isn’t even related to Peter by blood, either. And when Karen and Foggy are busy, or when Matt just isn’t involved with whatever crime fighting Peter is doing (why the masked idiots don’t just always work in teams, Michelle will never know), she finds herself back in Forest Hills, trying to see how long they could watch an old movie before switching the channel back to the news. It feels like a game, where MJ can only let herself breathe when she isn’t watching live footage of Peter fighting another crazy supervillain, and her and May’s record of how long they can keep the news off hovers at around seventy seconds.

She and May both understand the dangers that only seem to exist when the sun has done down in the west and not risen in the east, however, and they tell each other white lies over the phone on the nights it feels worse than normal. Peter always comes back in one piece, even if that piece may include a broken bone or two, and things are okay, if fragile.

* * *

Peter knows it can’t always be easy for MJ, dating a disaster vigilante like him. He’s hurt a lot, he knows, and he often comes home soaking wet from the rain or snow, exhausted. Sometimes it feels like they can go days without having a good conversation, but they persevere. Eventually, the two of them make peace with the fact that the difficult times will come whether they’re with each other or not, and the best they can do is make things a little easier for each other.

* * *

So MJ keeps learning how to nurse him back to health, and Claire Temple eventually officially declares that MJ is her apprentice, a promotion that Foggy quickly makes clear that Matt is not allowed to try to leverage to decrease the length of his orders for bedrest. This joke is on Matt though, Peter gripes, because MJ is even harsher. (Peter is right.)

Eventually, Spider-Man’s girlfriend is concluded to be an identity as secret and impossible to determine as Spider-Man’s, and people largely forget about her as anything other than a fictional concept. MJ doesn’t mind. As far as she’s concerned, if by the time she and Peter die their identities are still or continue to be secret, that wouldn’t be a bad thing.

At one point, Michelle is kidnapped when someone realizes she is Spider-Man girlfriend, although the muggers can’t seem to figure out who she is. She’d sooner die than tell them Peter’s identity, but she fortunately has to do neither, and is rescued in short order. She and Peter hold each other extra close later that night, and she lies and tells him that next time she’ll save herself and tell his secret.

* * *

They keep showing each other their love with the little things. Peter teaches her self defense, too, and it eases both of their minds to know she can better defend herself in the future. (If they take far too long to really start the learning, that’s only because Peter’s hands guiding her body into the right position can be… distracting for the both of them). Peter also starts helping a bit with MJ’s legal work, and he learns to cook a few of her favorite childhood dishes. She lets him take her to Synagogue, and they buy a yahrzeit candle and plan to light it for Ben in the fall. Peter teaches her how to make webbing, and she spends an evening a week helping him do so, proud that she do something to help keep him safe.

* * *

It’s hectic, of course, but their lives were hectic before, too, and now that at least have people to share it with. And sure, sometimes MJ really needs to sleep and Peter shows up bleeding from another wound, and sometimes MJ finishes off the coffee without telling Peter, but together, they make it work. And together, they’re as close as they can get to peace.

**Author's Note:**

> I tried to match different sections up with different parts of the song. Let me know how I did. :)
> 
> Let me know what you think! As always, Comments and Kudos meant the world to me.


End file.
